Mrs. Garlett’s death?”

Mr. Kentworthy began to feel sorry he had said anything 72about that side of his investigations. He had been tempted into indiscretion by his liking for this man, and his growing conviction that Harry Garlett’s wife had died an absolutely natural death.

72

It was as a friend of these foolish, if honest, people that he had just said what he knew was true. After all, it was perhaps just as well that they should know the kind of gossip floating about.

“The most serious thing I have heard,” he said quietly, “is that your niece and Mr. Garlett occasionally met secretly, late at night, in a little wood which forms part of Mr. Garlett’s property.”

Dr. Maclean stared at the speaker with growing anger and astonishment, and the other, pursuing his advantage, as even the kindest men are sometimes tempted to do, went on—

“I have actually spoken to the person who saw them there on at least two occasions.”

Again Dr. Maclean got up. “You have actually found a man or woman who declares that he or she saw my niece, Jean Bower, and Harry Garlett, under the compromising circumstances you have described?”

“No,” exclaimed the other quickly. “I cannot say that the person in question mentioned Miss Bower. What she said—I admit it is a woman—was that she had twice seen Mr. Garlett and a young lady in the wood forming part of the Thatched House property, and that, on the second occasion, she overheard something like an altercation between the two. Garlett’s companion burst into tears and reproached him, from what I can make out, for his coldness to her.”

“Good God!” exclaimed Dr. Maclean.

He sat down again, heavily. He felt suddenly years older.

“Having said so much, I think it is only fair to you to read the exact words I put down after seeing the young woman in question.”

“Young woman? Then the author of this infamous lie is not Miss Prince?” said the doctor to himself as he listened to the inspector beginning to read from his notebook.

“It was one day late in April, I cannot fix the date. When I got to the little wood I saw Mr. Garlett and a young lady walking down the path. I did not want them to see me, so I hid behind 73some 

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